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Project 21: Designing an HCI Web Page
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Introduction

Designing a simple interface is a challenge. Design requires an understanding of users' requirements and task performance, experience in incorporating user-centered software guidelines, and the ability to apply heuristics to assess usability during the design process. Design decisions are often difficult to make because each interface is unique and has special purpose. As you gain insight into user interface design strategies and apply these to your own design that you will create in this assignment, you will experience first-hand the difficulties and pitfalls of user-interface design.

Requirements

This assignment requires as a minimum:

 1. Design your own Human-Computer Interaction World Wide Web page. Be as creative as you like in terms of the use of graphics, pictures, animations, text, etc. This Web page is to represent YOUR view of HCI as an area of study, as a link to other HCI resources on the Internet. Your HCI Web page will be linked to the "hci" online study area for this course so that your work is shared with other students. You can design your HCI Web page for graphical browser viewing (e.g. Netscape) or for text browser viewing (e.g. Lynx). Note: The theme of the Web page MUST BE a HCI-related theme.

When designing your HCI Web page, consider the user population to represent graduate students who are accessing the interface to gain a conceptual and/or visual perspective on HCI.

 2. Designing a Web page is one thing. How do you know it is usable, functional, appealing, consistent, navigatable, etc.? You will need to conduct a rough usability analysis of your design. To accomplish this, get people to evaluate your design based on usability heuristics and strategies presented in class. Present this data in the design report.

 3. A design report is required that details the design process-- the requirements, specifications, the "thinking process" that went into the design, and an integration of literature to support the design strategies you have chosen to incorporate into your HCI page. If possible, present a view of the home page and the subsequent submenus and links.

Provide a full URL address for your Web page on the title page of the report. (Make sure to open file permissions for the Web site so that it can be accessed by others.) Present a "reaction" section that specifies your view of design from this experience and perhaps some of the limitations that THIS design produced. The report should be about 15 pages in length. Note: your grade will weigh heavily on the work contained in the report, so make sure the report is scholarly and the discussion is well-researched.

 4. Follow APA format to prepare the report. Write in the third person narrative.
 

Laurie Dringus

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Last Updated: 12 March 2000